


These are a Few of My Favorite Things

by TheWordBox



Series: These Are a Few of My Favorite Things [1]
Category: Camp Camp (Web Series)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-21
Updated: 2017-09-02
Packaged: 2018-12-18 10:50:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11872806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheWordBox/pseuds/TheWordBox
Summary: A little character study of Nikki.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So this is how this works:  
> Each chapter is designated to a particular thing. As a tribute to Nikki's fast-paced ten-year-old brain, they're all written in present-tense, sans maybe a special chapter or two. These are drabbles, meaning their lengths and topics are up to my good judgement, and any chronological order is coincidental. Due to my unfortunate condition of constant, unending homework, the release of these things is sporadic.
> 
> My parents call my work on this site a privilege, whereas I call it healthy therapy. So each of these is laced with the love of an author. I hope you enjoy this little project as much as I. If you do, show me with some kudos. Tell me with some comments. Help me improve my writing. Help me help you.  
> All this being said, Camp Camp and all of its delightful characters are owned by Rooster Teeth. I thank them profusely for giving us this show.

Nikki likes trees.

_Trees_ like _Nikki_.

They give her food; and food is great! They give her water; but only in emergency situations, because she always feels bad when cutting a tree’s trunk to get to its water storage. They give her shelter; when she was left in the woods after the Flower Scouts chased her away, she spent a few nights nestled in gently creaking branches under the glowing, dusty stars, and the feeling of leaves, lichen, and bark had been a great comfort at the time. They give her a playground; what’s more fun than leaping from branch to branch as you rocket through the forest? They give her a hiding place; because everyone needs a place to be alone once in a while. They give a lookout tower; Nikki enjoys watching everybody go about their daily business, and especially loves to join the fray with her friends when it looks fun.

Nikki’s sitting in a lookout tree right now, and she’s already pretty sure this is her favorite one, though her conclusion was made in less than twenty-four hours of her arrival at Camp Campbell. Her certainty isn’t unfounded, though; this little perch she’s sitting in offers a perfect view of the Mess Hall’s entrance. The doors are wide open, and inside Gwen can be seen instructing a few campers to clean the colorful disaster left from before. The chaos from earlier had died down, and Nikki technically didn’t make any messes, so she doesn’t have to help. Neither does Max, nor does Neil.

First the first time today, Nikki has an opportunity to think about her new relationship with those two. There’s not a lot to think about; She met them. They met her. They had fun together, and the Max gave her a place to sleep. First impressions were good all around. She sees no reason to fight her situation.

“Nikki! You in here?” The girl in question is pulled back to the present at the sound of her name. That’s Neil’s voice; and there he is, peeking into the mess hall. He’s looking for her. No one had ever done that before.

She’s on the ground and by his side in a second. “Yes, Neil?”

“Gah!” He whirls around to come face to face with her. “Where’d you come from? No, you know what, never mind. Max is offering to give us a tour of the camp. A good one, not the vague bullshit David gave out. You in?”

“Sure! Where is he?”

“At the tent. Said we might as well start at our base of operations. He also said we couldn’t start at the mess hall, because it’s too hard to sneak past all these people at once to get to the back areas. Let’s get going.”

“Alright! This is gonna be fun!” Nikki whoops as she half-runs to keep up with Neil's long strides. Behind the two newly-made friends, Nikki’s tree sways gently in the afternoon breeze.


	2. Chapter 2

Nikki doesn’t like Nurf. _At first_.

Because at first, all she sees in Nurf is a bully who beats up Neil, Dolph, and any other victims he can catch. He never bullies her or Max, though; Max is too cunning for him, and Nikki is too fast. She sees him as nothing but a bully, and she’s never had to see anything else.

Today, however, what she sees is Nurf sitting under her favorite tree. Just sitting with a knife in his hands, gazing at the lake. For a boy who rarely stops moving, let alone sits down, this is odd. Strange behavior in a bully was not something to trifle with. Nikki can’t be bothered to seek out help in the curious--and possibly urgent--situation, so she gathers matters into her own hands.

“What are you doing underneath my tree, Nurf?”

Even when sitting, the bully seems to tower over her. He doesn’t have to move his head at all to meet her eye-to-eye. “What are you talking about,” he grunts. “I thought you liked the tree in front of the mess hall.”

“I _do_ , but from here I can see the lake _and_ the tents, so I can warn Max quickly if I see something coming from Spooky Island.”

“You keep a lookout too, huh? Good thing. Two pairs of eyes is better than one.”

“Wait. _You_ keep a lookout on the lake, Nurf? Wait! You keep a _lookout_?”

“Don’t act so surprised. It’s my contribution to the camp. I feel like all I ever do  around here is bully everyone, and I wanted to give something back to feel better about myself. Besides,” he adds, shifting his gaze over to the ominous rock, “something about that place makes me feel insecure, like there’s something over there that’s not right.”

Nikki’s mind flashes back to Campbell’s anguished, eerie, paralysing torture chamber; the shackles, the wooden boards, the weapons, the hair and blood--

“ _Nikki!_ Fucking answer me, dammit!” One hearty smack to her face and Nikki is back in reality. On the ground, with a throbbing temple.

“Hey! What gives?” Nikki gripes at Nurf. He looks like he can’t decide if he’s enraged or worried. When he sees her scowling, tearful countenance, he takes a deep breath.

“Okay! Okay. You’re okay. You looked like you were having post-traumatic stress or something. I’m glad you snapped out of it. How are you feeling?”

“My head hurts!” Nikki pauses to truly consider his question, then whines, “And I’m hungry.”

An abrupt growling noise vibrates the earth beneath her, and Nurf looks down at his belly. “Huh. I guess I’m hungry too. Looks like it’s time for lunch.” He makes to walk past her, then stops, and turns to face her. “Hey, Nikki. Seeing how we’re both working to make this camp a safer place, I want you to have this.” He holds out his knife to her, hilt-first. “Just in case something _does_ show up, you can better defend yourself. You can’t outrun everything, you know.”

Nikki’s not quite sure if she’s comprehending his words. “A-are you sure about this, Nurf? If _I_ have your knife, that means you _don’t_ have your knife!”

“Eh. I’ve got more.” the bully shrugs. After another moment of the wild child’s stunned silence, he shoves it into her hand and barks, “Now hurry up and get something to eat or I’ll pound you!”

“Uh, right!” Nikki scampers away from the tree. Nurf follows her, but goes at a slower pace.

She’s already got a plateful of food when he makes it to the mess hall and shoves Preston out of the way to gain a clear path to the kitchen window. After he’s gotten some food, he sits at a table in a corner and begins to shovel food in his mouth.

Some of the foods on his plate are the same as the foods on hers: potatoes, bacon, the weird stuff the Quartermaster makes… they must like a lot of the same staples. For the boy who gives Neil wedgies, he seems to be very nice; Nikki can’t think of any other camper who would give her a weapon. With all the tentative stealth of a kitten, Nikki slides herself into the seat across from the hulking boy and asks, “Hey. Do you wanna see who can eat more in a minute?”

Nurf stares at her like she’s asked him if he’s ever had friggatriskaidekaphobia. Then he grins and shouts, “Hell yeah! Ready, set, GO!”

As Nikki inhales her potatoes, she decides that if all bullies are like Nurf, maybe they aren’t so bad after all. At the very least, she likes Nurf.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one ended up with a bit of Makki in it. Not necessarily a bad thing, because I like how this one turned out, but I know some people don't like this pairing. You've been warned.

Nikki likes the end of the day. When she and her boys are in their tent (she sneaks in and the other girls never care enough to tattle) and the sun has long gone down. Neil’s homemade lantern is the only source of light in the vicinity, and her eyelids start to feel itchy. She knows this is when Max is tired from a long day of being cynical and pretending to hate everything. This is the time when she pounces.

“Max, tell us a bedtime story.”

“Hell no.”

“Pleeeease?”

“Leave him alone, Nikki, it’s time for bed. If we’re going to survive another day here, we need at least eight hours of uninterrupted sleep.”

“But I really wanna hear one! Pleeease, Max?”

“Jesus, Nikki, how old are you? Four?”

This is their script they rehearse every night, with minimal revisions, and the redundancy of it can be heard in how meaningless the insults are, though Nikki’s earnest desire is still genuine. True to the script of their evenings, Max eventually relents, with the customary ‘if it’ll get her to go to sleep’ muttered to Neil.

Neither of the other two campers in the tent believe him after all the times he’s given in to Nikki’s pleading eyes without fail, but after Nikki’s obligated exclamation of enjoyment, it gets them their story. This is where the script ends and the best part of the evening starts, for Max’s bedtime stories are unparalleled. Preston and David alike would be moved to tears if they ever found out about these enamoring evenings.

Max never tells a story twice unless Nikki begs him to. He orchestrates classic bedtime stories that he knows, the original, gory ones, with lots of animals and trees which he knows delight her. If the three had spent the day separated, he tells them about how his day had gone, and they tell him about theirs. Sometimes, Max will narrate a point of history, and Neil will correct him, and they’ll pause the lesson to argue facts. Max tells them about the traditions of his culture, or Neil talks about the traditions of his, and even Nikki will sometimes have a story or two to tell. Though Max isn’t always the storyteller, it’s rarely Nikki or Neil, because while Neil enjoys these evenings, and Nikki’s the one who brings them about, storytime is for Max. This is his time to contribute something besides a devilish scheme or sarcastic quip. At storytime, it’s okay for him to genuinely smile, though he still rarely laughs. This is his chance to do something nice for his friends, his companions, his partners. The evenings are a meaningful, cherished time for all of them, but none more so than Max.

They always end up sleeping in a pile, a bizarre-yet-cuddly tangle of pillows, sleeping bags, fluffy paraphernalia, and each other. Somehow, they manage a consistency here as well: Neil on the left, Max on the right, and Nikki in the middle—sort of. Often, due to her habit of tossing and turning in her sleep, Max’s habit of grabbing onto things in his sleep, and Neil’s habit of reciting science trivia or complicated math equations in his sleep, Nikki’s head or a least one of her limbs end up on top of Max, and Max would hold on to her once she was there, and Neil would wake himself up with his own unconscious ramblings. Ultimately ruining his goal for eight consecutive hours of sleep, he gets up, puts his own belongings back in order, and makes some coffee. Never once bothering the other two cuddling beings on the floor.

Nikki loves evenings, but mornings are pretty great too.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one has a vague correlation to the previous chapter, and I think after this one, I want to set up future drabbles as individual works and tie them together as a series. It just seems easier for readers to sift through them that way, and the tags will be less of a messy jumble.

Nikki never thought she would like stealth as much as she does.

She’s loved the night for as long as she can remember; for the night brings the stars and weird sounds and an aura of mystery.

At night, she experiences the delightful thrill of sneaking around the dark camp grounds. Whether she’s getting a snack from the pantry, retrieving something in preparation for one of Max’s plans, or investigating the woods when the weird noises grow especially loud, she relishes the adventures that take place when no one else is around to participate. These adventures are merely occasional, however. Her reliance on stealth truly springs from the trek she makes every night from Point A to Point B; Point A representing the girls’ tent to which she’d been relegated upon her arrival to Camp Campbell, and Point B representing the tent where she, Max, and Neil sleep. In order to get plenty of storytime, Nikki must make her move as soon as possible, and it’s always a gamble to weave past the counselors, the Quartermaster, and the other campers. Nikki thinks she may be developing a gambling problem, because this is _fun._

It’s fun to say goodnight to Gwen and David whilst snickering under her breath, much to Max’s exasperated worry that they might catch on to her poorly hidden, not to mention un-strategically consistent, plan. It’s fun to wait for the sun to go down with a bouncing giddiness that Nerris and Ered fail to share. It’s fun to peek through the tent flap surreptitiously, whisper a quick,”Goodnight!” and slip outside with her ratty pillow under her arm. It’s fun to listen as closely as possible to the rustling inside each of the tents as she passes them to get to the one with the soft light peeking from behind the tent flap.

“What are you doing out here, Nikki?”

“G-YAH-ah-AH!”

“Ow! Shit, Nikki, calm down! It’s just me.”

Nikki blinks. “Gwen?”

“Yes, you rabid little troglodyte, now get off of me.”

“Ah, right,” Nikki chuckles nervously as she gets off of Gwen and picks her pillow up off the ground. “Sorry about that. Reflexes, you know.”

“Yeah, I know. Fight or flight responses to fright. You fight. You fake it all the time with David to distract him while your devilish friends pull off some horrific stunt. Plus, I took Psych. I kind of know these things.”

The two girls stare at one another in silence for a moment. Then Gwen sighs and reiterates. “Nikki, what are you doing?”

“Ummm… going to get a snack?”

“You need your pillow to in tow to get some late-night pudding?” Gwen raises her eyebrow at the cushion Nikki is clinging to. It’s almost as tall as her, covered in dirt, and there’s at least one open hole leaking stuffing and candy bars. “It looks to me like you made your snack run earlier today. At least turn the pillow right-side up so they don’t fall out.”

Nikki shifts her pillow/snack sack accordingly. In an effort to avoid an uncomfortable silence, Nikki fills the gap. “Anyhowever, what are you doing out here, Gwen? You and the other grown-ups usually don’t come over to the tent grounds.”

“Nurf and I were having a therapy session, and it ran a little late. I was tucking him in.” Gwen replies. Her eyes slide from Nikki’s sagging bag of stuffing and candy over to the tent with the glowing inside. Max and Neil are probably wondering what’s taking her so long.

Nikki blinks. “You and Nurf were what?”

“Come with me, Nikki.”

Nikki knows now that Gwen’s questioning was a formality of the alpha to pup relationship, to see if she would choose to be honest about her intention. She doesn’t move. “Am I in trouble?”

“No, but you should be. Come on.”

This time, Nikki obliges Gwen’s order. Though she finds some security in Gwen’s strangely calm demeanor, she still buries her face in her pillow for comfort. The boys must be really worried right now, and the tiny girl doesn’t know whether or not they should be.

Nikki’s cushion-y state allows her to bounce off of Gwen’s boot when she bumps into her. They’ve stopped in front of the counselor’s cabin. The tall woman turns to Nikki. “Give me the pillow, and stay out here.” Once again, Nikki obeys, and when Gwen enters the cabin, she is alone.

While it’s indisputable that being alone is necessary at some points in life, Nikki typically doesn’t take it well. Especially at night. This sort of fear has only intensified since she came to Camp Campbell. Something about having friends that stuck around for more than two days has made her much more clingy and needy for support, comfort, and most of all, company. With her pillow gone, and (she assumes) Gwen mad at her, not even the sound of wolves howling in the distance can sooth Nikki’s anxious sorrow.

Gwen somehow must have known Nikki would be on the verge of tears by the time she came back out, because hands the miniscule creature a tissue before she even closes the door. After a minute, the time in which Nikki pulls herself together, she says, “Here, you little scamp,” and hands her a big, bulky object.

It’s a pillow. A stiff-yet-fluffy pillow, in prime pillow-fighting condition. It’s covered in a pillowcase depicting a werewolf howling at two moons.

“That sad sack of fluff you had was on its last legs,” Gwen said. “It wasn’t going to survive much longer. I just bought that thing last week, so I’m keeping the candy as payment. I’m not even going to bother asking you to stop sneaking around at night, but I will ask this of you; can you a least try to make sure the other campers don’t find out? Because if anyone else starts waking me up while they rifle through the food stock, I’m going to have to find a way to explain why I broke a camper’s leg while in a blind, half-asleep rage. Now, we’re going to the tent where Nerris and Ered are sleeping, collect your things _very quietly,_ and move it all over to Max and Neil’s tent. Got it?”

“Sounds like a plan, Gwen. But there’s one problem…”

Ten minutes later, the pigtailed girl is being shoved in front of her ‘new’ sleeping tent, still struggling to keep her arms wrapped around her pillow. Gwen is heading back to her cabin, muttering things like, “I should have known that kid didn’t pack any clothes. Now I’m going to have to get clothes for the brat. Stuff like _this_ is why I go to therapy.” Nikki barely brushes the tent flap when a hand shoots out, grabs her wrist, and hauls her inside. The hand is joined by its partner and rips the pillow away from her to reveal a very furious Max.

He snatches her up by the suspenders and snarls, “ _The actual fuck, Nikki?_ What took you so long?”

“Max, don’t shout at her. The other campers will hear.” Neil frets. “Although I see your point, it’s not a good idea to be outside alone when the wilderness is so close. Then again, this is Nikki we’re about, so it might not be as dangerous as for her as we think…”

“Of course it’s fucking dangerous, Neil! The Quartermaster has a sample of her hair! We never know when the Wood Scouts are going to launch a raid! Even the Flower Scouts have snuck over here, and they locked her in a goddamn closet! Hanging upside down by the foot! Do you know how fucking _painful_ that is?”

“Well, I’d estimate about—”

“Don’t answer that! It’s never happened to you, so you don’t get a say!” Max turns around and begins busying himself with his bedding. “You all can forget about me telling you guys a story. Get to sleep on your own!”

“... Anyways, while Max is recovering from that severely escalated rant,” Neil says, “I’m genuinely curious, Nikki; what took you so long? You’ve been delayed before, but never for more than twenty minutes. And why does your pillow have Gwen’s trash printed all over it?”

“Because she gave it to me.” Nikki replies. She retrieves the cushion from the corner Max cast it into, sets it down in between the boys, and swipes her favorite blanket, the really fluffy one covered in platypus-prints and chocolate smears, from Max’s side and cocoons herself within it.

The cynical boy doesn’t try to snatch it back, but he does growl, “So you were caught?”

“Yeah, but it’s okay. She says I can officially sleep in here now.”

“Well, that’s great. You’ll spend less nights sneaking around. Isn’t that great, Max? A decreased likelihood of abduction by the Quartermaster’s hands… er, hand.”

“Hmph.”

“But I like sneaking around. It’s fun.”

Neil rolls his eyes and settles onto the blankets he spread out on the floor. “I know you like it, Nikki. I have no fucking idea why you do, but it is undisputed fact that it’s a thing. Max and I would just feel better about you being outside when it’s dark out if we were with you. Besides, it’s more fun when all three of us are swiping pudding cups.”

“Don’t speak for me, Neil.”

“Shut up, Max.”

“Aww, you guys are awesome! Neil, you’re such a… mom…” Nikki’s statement is lost to an incredibly drawn-out yawn. The roller-coaster of high-running emotions that took place this evening, coupled with holding pillows bigger than herself for long-ish periods of time, has left her drained and half-conscious.

“Yeah, yeah. You need to get to bed, Kiddo.”

“M’kay. G’night…” Nikki slurs as Neil turns off his lantern. “... Max, can you tell me a story?”

“Does _nobody_ listen to what I say? Go to sleep, Nik.”

“Please?”

“Y’know, Nikki, seeing how you were thirty-five minutes late, and apparently Gwen gave you a trash-print pillow to replace your old garbage one, I’d say _you_ owe _us_ a bedtime story.”

“Okaaay,” Nikki drags out the word in her tired stupor. “I suppose it starts when Gwen caught me outside the girls’ tent with my pillow. I accidentally tackled her. Reflexes, you know…”

As Nikki’s voice drifts them all through her encounter, and by extension, everyone’s slumber, Nikki’s last thought is how much she likes Gwen, whose hen-pecking and maternal instincts rivaled even Neil’s… sometimes.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> New rule, folks.  
> I like comments. It makes my day when I see one in my inbox, and when they're ripe with constructive criticism and guidance, I'm motivated for days to put the tips I've been given to use. So, I've decided the number of comments in my inbox will equate to the maximum number of drabbles I post here. The comments I write don't count, and if I have more comments than posted drabbles, that doesn't necessarily mean I'll have time to belt out a new chapter the next day.  
> If you want to leave a comment, but you don't know what to write, then here's an question for you; if you had to choose between me focusing on these drabbles or starting something new, what would it be? 'Cause right now I've got an idea for an Camp Camp AU in my head, but I don't know whether or not to start it because of this little project. Let me know, 'kay?  
> Thank you, and I love your consideration for reading this! It means a lot to me.


End file.
